The Mad, Mad World
by notrealname
Summary: This is a short story I wrote in less than an hour. It tells of a cannibal and his demise. It should take place after the "Wasteland Wanderer" purifies the Potomac. If reviews are good, I will begin to embark upon a longer story since I'm encouraged.


A year ago, it would have been unfathomable to Robert Pewter that an American would resort to cannibalism. Within another year, Pewter had undergone the transformation himself. Slowly, he lost friends, as he quietly ate them one by one. Within another year, any remaining friends of Robert had lost all faith in him. Rumors of his cannibalism spread. Very soon, Capitol regulators began to raid Robert's makeshift habitats. The brave men and women in armor would arrive at the bloody, grimy habitats to find that, not only had Robert disappeared, he had left the half-eaten remains of some poor man, woman, or child.

Then they would turn, and find themselves face to face with Robert himself. The next week, the brothers and sisters of the regulators would come and search for their long lost siblings, only to find that they too have become another man's dinner. In this way did Robert Pewter live: a horrible life, shunned by humans. Upon arriving at Megaton's gates, the hapless Deputy Weld pointed out Robert's condition, recognizing the horribly hungry face from the regulator posters. Robert made short work of Deputy Weld with his combat shotgun, only to come face to face with Deputy Steel, who chased Robert away from Megaton.

Robert, having suffered numerous plasma burns in his lower torso, sought to soothe them in the now clean and fresh Potomac. It was a lucky break for him, he knew. He managed to survive a Mr. Gutsy, and now he can clean his wound in the suddenly radiation-free Potomac. Stories of a Brotherhood scientific achievement reached him, but it was nothing he cared for.

And there he was, crawling up the rocky outcrop. He peered over the top of the ledge and saw two men, drawing a wooden rowboat in from the gentle tides of the Potomac. They would be his dinner for that day. He returned to the temporary shelter he had erected from various animal hides beneath a jutting cliff and planned a devious, failsafe plan. And that night, he found himself on a cliff just above where the two men were camping. He drew out his slashing knife, and readied to drop to his kill.

But at that moment, one of the men said, "There's someone here. I can feel it." The other man tensed and drew out a hunting rifle. The first man stood and looked around. Robert ducked back over the cliff and hid behind a rock. These men were careful, but are no match for Robert Pewter, who had single-handedly dispatched five regulators. Or at least, that's what Robert thought.

Robert drew out his six-shot revolver, and slowly moved towards the men's camp, hugging a dark and rocky ledge. But then he heard a low whine—a sound that Robert had never heard before. The whine gradually grew loud and suddenly cut off. Then one of the men said, "I'm willing to bet he never got shot with a gauss gun before."

The other man replied, "Poor sod. He's completely fucked." Robert heard a distinctive click and clap, the sounds of a fully loaded sub-machinegun. Robert tensed, but kept his revolver ready. Then, in a flurry of movements, Robert swung around a rocky wall and faced the men's campsite under the cliff. The fire was still burning, and the tents still flapping the wind, but neither of the two men were to be seen.

_Fuck_, thought Robert. _They move so fucking fast and quietly_. Then he saw them, to his left. He spun and fired his six shots. He saw blood spurt on both men, who had cleverly ambushed him. To his amusement, neither of them was aiming at him. Instead, their shots were flying high and wild, impacting the cliff wall. _Very clever_, thought Robert. He finished off the duo with an earnest round, and reloaded and put another five bullets into the body of the man with the strange looking, high-tech gun.

The ground rumbled, and dust dropped onto Robert's shoulders. He was confused and he looked around, trying to find the source of the noise. Then, in a horrifying realization, he realized why the two men were "missing" their shots. The cliff crumbled, and large sharp rocks crashed down upon Robert's fragile body, burying his blood and gore under a ton of dirt.

The next day, five men arrived in rowboats. One of the men approached the pile of dirt and, with a quick arms gesture, set off an explosion causing the rocks to fly everywhere. After the dust settled, the man carefully approached the dead bodies. He found the gauss rifle, and then the dead body of Robert the cannibal.

This man, however, did not recognize Robert the cannibal. He saw the dead body and said, "Poor sod. He got completely fucked by our advanced team." The man turned to his four heavily armed cohorts and said, "It's a mad, mad world. Let's bring some order into it."

Within the day, the five men reached Megaton. They reported the death of the so-called "Robert Pewter", to the relief of every citizen in Megaton. Albeit puzzled, the man did not wait to figure out why. In a short but deadly battle, the man quickly enslaved every citizen, and reprogrammed Deputy Steel and the newly-repaired Deputy Weld to his cause.

Then one of the citizens of Megaton said to the captor, "You know why we hated Robert Pewter? He wasn't just a killer; he was a cannibal. But he was just too good for slavery."


End file.
